Aug 27 2009
Sister Donna’s Prayer of the Heart Series: Part 2 of 6
Part 2: What is Prayer of the Heart?
I like very much Sister Donna’s insight that Lectio Divina and prayer of the heart go hand-in-hand; that we immerse ourselves in sacred reading and then offer ourselves to God and He to us, exactly in the same way as when we participate in the two parts of the Mass, first through the Liturgy of the Word and then through the Liturgy of the Eucharist. I have never heard anyone make this particular comparison before.
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There are some souls and minds so scattered they are like wild horses no one can stop. Now they’re running here, now there, always restless…. This restlessness is either caused by the soul’s nature or permitted by God. I pity these souls greatly, for they seem to be like very thirsty persons who see water in the distance, but when they want to go there, they meet someone who prevents their passing from the beginning through the middle to the end.
[The Way of Perfection, Chapter 19, Paragraph 2]
O Sisters, those of you who cannot engage in much discursive reflection with the intellect or keep your mind from distraction, get used to this practice! Get used to it! See, I know that you can do this; for I suffered many years from the trial – and it is a very great one – of not being able to quiet the mind in anything. But I know that the Lord does not leave us so abandoned; for if we humbly ask Him for this friendship, He will not deny it to us. And if we cannot succeed in one year, we will succeed later. Let’s not regret the time that is so well spent. Who’s making us hurry? I am speaking of acquiring this habit and of striving to walk alongside this true Master.
[The Way of Perfection, Chapter 26, Paragraph 2]
Distractions? What are those? (j/k) It’s comforting to think He is not as impatient as anyone we have ever known.
http://www.orthodoxprayer.org/Jesus%20Prayer.html
Thank you so much for posting these
Yes, I must say when I found the series, I was a little surprised that it was based on Teresa’s ‘Way of Perfection’, because we usually think of the Jesus Prayer, the Philokalia and the Desert Fathers when we hear “prayer of the heart”, and with Teresa we are accustomed to “contemplative prayer”. But Sr. Donna was taking a course in Rome, which I think encompassed more than St. Teresa of Avila, and I like very much how she pulls all sorts of things together – prayer of the heart, contemplative prayer, lectio divina, the Mass, etc., because it reinforces our own experience of how everything is inter-related and, can I say, inter-experienced. Thank you so much for visiting!
A R.C. Italian friend suggested praying the Jesus Prayer in times of trouble around me; she insisted it would defuse the situation. It does. If anything, it doesn’t raise one up, it lowers one into a hard moment, just as Jesus lowered Himself into mere humanity in order to redeem it. I don’t know if by praying it I am asking to take the blame for this moment (”..a sinner”) or not, but I know that my heart wants to take it, if that’s what it takes for these others to be alright or safe. I don’t go to many trouble spots, but I’ve found the supermarket a veritable hotbed of child-smack/child-threaten, and it nearly stops my heart — and until the Jesus Prayer was given me, I had nothing but a thundering heart and a “O please God, do something. If I say anything to these folks, it’ll likely go even worse on the child later or next time.” I started praying the Jesus prayer there, too, and the trouble dissipates like fog. It is amazing. If we all prayed it in times of shouting or animosity, I sincerely believe there’d be no shouting or animosity on earth ever again.
G, the words “inter-related” and “inter-experienced” are so consoling to me. I am one for whom it seems everything is inter-related and iter-experienced. I cannot concentrate on any body of prayer for long, and could never quite distinguish between any forms of contemplative prayer. I’m not saying it well, but you did. My heart is happier today.